United Liberty

Defense Secretary Robert Gates says that the United States has not received intelligence on the location of Osama bin Laden in some time:

Defense Secretary Robert Gates says the United States has not had good intelligence on the whereabouts of terrorist Osama bin Laden in years.

Gates made the comment in an interview to be aired Sunday on ABC’s “This Week.”

Asked whether he could confirm recent reports that bin Laden had been seen recently in Afghanistan, Gates said “no.” Media reports late this week mentioned accounts of unconfirmed bin Laden sightings in recent weeks.

Bin Laden, the leader of al-Qaida, is believed to be hiding on the Pakistan side of the border with Afghanistan.

This is what happens when you turn your sites to a relatively pointless war in another country that presented to real threat instead of going after the real enemy.

One of the biggest holes within mainstream Republicans’ espoused support of free markets is their perpetuation of the military industrial complex. Whole towns in this country revolve around the military, including service jobs on bases, office jobs and weapons manufacturing in addition to soldiering. That sort of collective governmental dependency makes the large cities of their Democratic counterparts look laissez-faire in comparison.

Another of President Obama’s nominations has sunk like a rock:

ANOTHER day, another blow for Barack Obama’s hopes for a “new politics”. On Thursday February 12th, Senator Judd Gregg of New Hampshire announced that he had withdrawn as Mr Obama’s proposed secretary of commerce. Mr Gregg is a Republican—and one, to boot, who once voted for the Commerce Department to be abolished. Bringing him into the cabinet had been billed by the Obama team as an important sign of Mr Obama’s commitment to government from the centre. Mr Gregg would have been the third of Mr Obama’s “post-partisan” appointments: his transport secretary, Ray LaHood is a Republican, and his defence secretary, Robert Gates, served in the same job under George Bush (though he does not describe himself as a Republican).

Dan Carlin, the host of the poular podcasts Common Sense and Hardcore History, gave me his thoughts on various subjects, varying from the attacks in India to Obama’s cabinet appointments.

What do you make of rumors that President-elect Obama will be keeping Robert Gates as Defense Secretary?

Well, as far as I can tell I am the only person in the world who doesn’t like the pick (and it sure looks like, at least for the early part of the Administration that Gates IS the likely pick).

For those keeping score at home, Obama’s rumored cabinet picks are now official:

President-elect Barack Obama today picked Sen. Hillary Clinton to be secretary of state. Obama said he had no doubt that Clinton is the right person to lead the state department. Obama also announced that he’s keeping Defense Secretary Robert Gates in his current post and tapped Eric Holder for attorney general.

Is anyone else thinking that the time period between election and inauguration should be sped up? It feels like Obama is already President.

Many of us are watching with great interest to see how things are shaping up with likely appointments for the new Obama Administration. Given all the talk about “change” in this election, one would hope that the appointments would indicate some definite moves away from the status quo. Obviously the President’s powers to change much of anything are quite limited by the Constitution (not that this has mattered so much to recent Presidents), with foreign policy being the area of greatest potential for change. An initial look at Obama’s likely appointments in matters of foreign affairs and national security leads this writer to question just how much change, if any, will occur in the conduct of foreign affairs.

There’s been some criticism leveled at Obama for his pick of Rahm Emanuel as his Chief of Staff:

House Republicans are said to hate Mr. Emanuel for his partisanship, and on Wednesday, the former Florida congressman Joe Scarborough said on his cable television show that Mr. Obama’s enlistment of Mr. Emanuel amounted to “politics as usual” when the president-elect had promised conciliation.